Another day at the water hole

BY JODY BARKER

Randy Rush and I were dive partners last August on the
Aucilla at the Latvis/Simpson site. It was your typical, hot
afternoon in the northern Florida Panhandle with a pleasant breeze.
This would be my first experience with underwater communication. We
would be able to communicate between each diver and also with the
divemaster on duty topside via radio sets built into our full-face
AGA masks. We had low visibility in the dark tannic-stained water. We
were "hogging" out overburden sediment with the six-inch dredge. We
had been down for a little over an hour, and the one thousand watt
snooper light was giving us a hard time. The light blinked a few more
times and Elnally went out completely. Randy called upstairs to
advise them he was sending me up to get a hand-held light to finish
out our shift. Now you have to understand one thing about Randy, he
has been a professional diver for many years. Traveling around the
world doing commercial diving he has acquired an expertise in getting
the job done efficiently. He has a tendency to be on the serious
side, where, an the other hand, (which would be my left), we sport
divers are not quite so serious. A few minutes later I returned with
the hand-held light, and operations resumed. Randy was using the
shovel, while I held the dredge in my right hand and the light with
the other. We were hunkered down, going to town, cooking on the front
burner, going through that overburden sediment as if there were no
tomorrow! Well, just about that time the light got just a tad too
close to the dredge and "whom!" in the blink of a eye, it sucked that
baby right out of my hands and right up the hose! We both watched the
light go up through the transparent hose all the way to the surface
where it would be discharged unceremoniously onto the screendeck. I
was laughing so hard I could hardly stand it. Looking over into my
partner's mask, all I could see was Randy's patented "I don't believe
this" look. About then, our radio silence was broken by the
divemaster on the surface, "Hey, big boys, did you lose something?" I
took a deep breath, and with a calm, cool, collected, even official
sounding voice, I keyed my mike,

"YES, RANDY DID, OVER!"

Diving Operations Supervision

From left: Mark Muniz, Michael Faught and Steve Glover
speek no evil, hear no evil and see no evil

Andy Hemmings desired to be an archaeologist ever since he
has been able to define the word. Archaeology is the study of past
cultures and their remains. As might be expected, Andy collects
fossils and has about eight arrowheads he found at a building site
near his home. However, Andy's pet hobby is gathering something some
people feel is reflective of our culture - beer cans.

As a result of can collecting, the upper half of the back
wall of Andy's bedroom looks like a montage of beer commercials, row
after row of beer cans held up by clips. That is only a sample of his
collection. The majority of it is in storage. He has been at it for
three years.

"I started collecting with a friend," Andy said. "Of
course I had to try and outdo him. It just stuck."

Andy also enjoys playing on the St. Peter's basketball
team. He is in 7th grade. His favorite subject is history. In fact,
he is taking an evening course in Minnesota history, through Oneida
Community College with his father.

"The question I would like to answer is 'who was in
America first and why,"' Andy said. "If someone said Columbus, all
I'd have to do to defeat them is say, ‘how come the Indians met
him?".

In spare time, Andy likes to read 17th century historical
books. But he keeps pretty busy. He has had a newspaper route for
four years. His major plans are to buy a car and to go to college. He
has one sister, Shannon, 10. They have three cats, Buttons, Spook
and Bits.